Playing outside of encounters

[cronuss]

Hey everyone,

While I've known a bit about D&D for over a decade, especially 2nd edition from the books and games (BG series, etc), I'm really new to DMing and 4th edition.

Myself and some friends picked up the books last weekend and gave it a go. Two nights in a row we played for about 3-4 hours each night, and I just improvised as DM for now.

I basically gave them some locations to play around in and then created some NPCs and plot along the way, then a few battles. It all went surprisingly well and everyone enjoyed themselves.

Here is my question:

I'm a bit blurry on how to manage gameplay and events while outside of an encounter. I understand that within an encounter you use the tiles and obey the rules of speed, turns, etc. So if someone wanted to pick a lot or use a bluff they would have to get to the object and then make it a standard action. If they fail, they would have to wait for their turn to attempt it again.

What about when you aren't in an "encounter"?

First of all, I'm having a hard time understanding what is or should be an actual "encounter" or not, What if my party is exploring without tiles and without being in an encounter, and I want to have a single monster attack? Is that an encounter?

More specifically, my question is in regards to how to handle the other things like lock picking, bluffs, rituals, spells, etc when outside of an encounter. Say my party goes into an Inn and they find a chest in there. Should I just let my rogue PC roll the dice infinitely to try and unlock it? Or what if someone wants to kill an NPC in that room? Or if they find a door they want to smash or lock pick, or if they want to cast a spell (is that even possible outside of an "encounter"?) or use a ritual?

I'm sorry if my questions are confusing or jumbled, but that should just show how confused I am on this whole subject.

I can not decipher when I should be using tiles and obeying speeds and turns.

I watched Chris Perkin's Robot Chicken session and he used tiles for basically the entire session, except for the intro.

Can someone clarify encounters, tiles, and ability/skill/power/etc usage when outside of encounters?

Thanks.

:\

 

[Mort_Q]

What if my party is exploring without tiles and without being in an encounter, and I want to have a single monster attack? Is that an encounter?

I'd say that an encounter starts whenever the party rolls initiative... so yes, even a single monster is an encounter... and easy one perhaps... but still an encounter...

 

[Mistwell]

Hey everyone,

While I've known a bit about D&D for over a decade, especially 2nd edition from the books and games (BG series, etc), I'm really new to DMing and 4th edition.

Myself and some friends picked up the books last weekend and gave it a go. Two nights in a row we played for about 3-4 hours each night, and I just improvised as DM for now.

I basically gave them some locations to play around in and then created some NPCs and plot along the way, then a few battles. It all went surprisingly well and everyone enjoyed themselves.

Here is my question:

I'm a bit blurry on how to manage gameplay and events while outside of an encounter. I understand that within an encounter you use the tiles and obey the rules of speed, turns, etc. So if someone wanted to pick a lot or use a bluff they would have to get to the object and then make it a standard action. If they fail, they would have to wait for their turn to attempt it again.

What about when you aren't in an "encounter"?

If they are not in an encounter, there is no need to worry about things like standard, minor, move, and free actions. You present the description for the scene, your players describe the actions of their characters. If the action has some risk to it if they fail, then it probably requires a skill check. If not, then people just describe what they are doing (or do it in the first person). If the scene requires many people making skill checks, it's probably a skill challenge. If it's easier to just have one person speak at a time, you can use initiative order or just go around the table in order.

First of all, I'm having a hard time understanding what is or should be an actual "encounter" or not, What if my party is exploring without tiles and without being in an encounter, and I want to have a single monster attack? Is that an encounter?

Yes, combat is an encounter, even if it is easy, and even if it is just one monster.

Pretty much anything which places the characters at risk, involves multiple characters in the action (or probably will), and which might get confusing if it's not done in an organized manner, is an encounter. In other words, all combat, and any event requiring multiple skill checks.

More specifically, my question is in regards to how to handle the other things like lock picking, bluffs, rituals, spells, etc when outside of an encounter. Say my party goes into an Inn and they find a chest in there. Should I just let my rogue PC roll the dice infinitely to try and unlock it?

If there is no risk to failure, then just let them "take 20". In other words, if your rogue rolled a natural 20, and added his bonus, would that beat the DC of the lock? If so, you can just describe it as "you work at the lock for a few minutes, and eventually you manage to open it". If that 20+bonus would still not beat the DC, then you instead say "try as you might, this lock is simply beyond your skills." There is no need to make an encounter out of this, or roll initiative. It's just a single skill check, and you shouldn't stop the action too long to deal with it.

Or what if someone wants to kill an NPC in that room?

Unless the NPC is a 1 hit point minion, it's combat. Combat is complicated, and usually involves multiple characters. You should treat combat as an encounter.

Or if they find a door they want to smash or lock pick, or if they want to cast a spell (is that even possible outside of an "encounter"?) or use a ritual?

Lock picking and door smashing, if done as a single event, do not require the use of the formal encounter. It's just a single skill check, and you should try to not bog things down by delaying that event with a formal encounter.

Yes, you can use powers (such as spells) outside of combat. As long as your characters have had a 5 minute break since their last encounter, then their encounter powers are usable again, and can be used outside of combat.

Yes, rituals are usually used outside of an encounter. If you want, you can describe the scene to add some flavor to the adventure. Or, you can just say "Ok, you make the necessary preparations, use the appropriate ingredients, make the right gestures and movements that you learned, and the ritual triggers. Roll the skill check to see how well you did with this ritual". Rituals are usually a single skill check event, just like a lock picking event or door smashing event. You CAN sprinkle them into combat or connect them in some way to combat or a skill challenge, but usually they are just a stand alone short event.

I'm sorry if my questions are confusing or jumbled, but that should just show how confused I am on this whole subject.

I can not decipher when I should be using tiles and obeying speeds and turns.

I watched Chris Perkin's Robot Chicken session and he used tiles for basically the entire session, except for the intro.

Can someone clarify encounters, tiles, and ability/skill/power/etc usage when outside of encounters?

Thanks.

:

Your confusion is perfectly natural, and many of us went through the same kinds of questions when first starting to play.

Chris's sessions are good, but he is focusing more on the intricacies of combat and skill challenges, rather than non-encounter events. His videos are more intended to teach the rules, than how to role play.

You don't need tiles and maps and miniatures and speed and movement amounts and such for all the events that happen between encounters. You just describe things, and the players interact with your descriptions. Only when it gets complicated, like with combat or a skill challenge, do you need to use the formal encounter format. And even then, if it is just a skill challenge, you often still won't need a map and tiles and miniatures and such.

 

[Amaroq]

I'm a bit blurry on how to manage gameplay and events while outside of an encounter. I understand that within an encounter you use the tiles and obey the rules of speed, turns, etc. So if someone wanted to pick a lot or use a bluff they would have to get to the object and then make it a standard action. If they fail, they would have to wait for their turn to attempt it again.

What about when you aren't in an "encounter"?

Same thing applies, basically. You want to give each player a "turn".

For example, as DM I recently had the party stuck in a non-lethal trap, that they were having a hard time getting out of. The bard, being a naturally exuberant player, had multiple ideas she wanted to try. After she tried one, and failed, she wanted to try another; I had to tell her "I'll come back to you," and asked the rest of the party what they were doing as she tried her complicated plan.

A very good DM I used to play for would take that one step further: he'd ask everybody at the table "What do you do?", and only after he had all of the answers would he let people know what happened. So, if the rogue is picking a lock, and I'm exploring the rags in the corner, and somebody else is opening a door ... well, all of those are happening almost simultaneously, with the possibility of, say, me finding something and not sharing it with the party, or a trap on the chest exploding and catching me and the rogue, or there being a monster behind the door and we're all out of position for it.

There isn't a "right way" and a "wrong way" here: find a system that works for you and for your players, and run with it.

First of all, I'm having a hard time understanding what is or should be an actual "encounter" or not, What if my party is exploring without tiles and without being in an encounter, and I want to have a single monster attack? Is that an encounter?

Yep. If its time to roll initiative, its time to break out the tiles, the minis, and call it an encounter.

More specifically, my question is in regards to how to handle the other things like lock picking, bluffs, rituals, spells, etc when outside of an encounter. Say my party goes into an Inn and they find a chest in there. Should I just let my rogue PC roll the dice infinitely to try and unlock it? Or what if someone wants to kill an NPC in that room? Or if they find a door they want to smash or lock pick, or if they want to cast a spell (is that even possible outside of an "encounter"?) or use a ritual?

Each of these is their own case.

The rogue trying to pick a chest in an inn? I'd say that's not an encounter .. but every time he "fails", there's a chance that somebody wanders into the room and discovers him, leaving him with a sticky situation to explain. That way, there's risk, there's reward (if he can get it open) and there's a consequence for failure.

If he were trying to pick a chest in a long-deserted dungeon, in which nothing was living .. hey, he's got all day, no need to make him roll a bunch.

Someone wants to attack an NPC in the inn? Okay, they want to start combat. Lay out the tiles and minis. Roll an Insight check for the target to see if they "see it coming". If not, let the 'attacker' have a Surprise round, then roll initiative for everybody in the room. I mean, this could become a classic bar brawl with improvised weapons ... or it could turn out that the patrons aren't minions, they're another group of adventurers ... maybe the bartender is really tough and has it out for the PC who started it ... who knows how it'll end!

Remember that a Surprise round only includes one action, and "I draw my sword" is a Minor action, ending that players' Surprise round.

Want to cast a spell? No problem, that's fine outside of combat. Just remember that spells have a duration (usually no more than 5 minutes), and even Encounter powers won't regenerate until the character takes a short rest (5+ minutes of doing very little).

I play a low-magic world, so anybody who starts an incantation (either a Ritual or a Spell) in public is asking for trouble, much the same as drawing a gun would be in the modern world.

My druid player wants to disappear into the woods to run a ritual that takes 4 hours to cast?

Okay, fine ... but as a DM, several things are important to keep in mind.

Time keeps passing - the other players don't stop to wait for the druid unless they tell me they want to sit somewhere for four hours ... and even if they do, my NPC's don't stop for four hours. The BBEG's plot keeps advancing (and usually I have a fairly tight timeline which the PC's need to beat). If the rest of the party get involved in a fight during those four hours, the druid is sitting it out.

Also, there's always the chance of a "wandering monster" interrupting the ritual. Old-school D&D included all sorts of wandering monster charts and chances of getting encountered depending on where you were. So, our druid casting a spell in the wilderness might scare off a bobcat, or get surprised by a wandering band of orcs, or ... hey, you're the DM, its up to you!

 

[UltimaGabe]

All of the responses so far have been spot-on (particularly Amaroq's). I've got one thing to clarify, though:

If the rogue wants to pick the lock, if there's nothing rushing him (no enemies around the corner, no damsel about to be sacrificed, no owner-of-the-chest watching him out of the corner of his eye), then yes, he can just keep rolling all he wants. After all, if you fail at a task, and you've got the time to try again, why wouldn't you?

To make this situation a bit less of a waste of valuable game-time, though, 3e introduced the "Take 20" rule- if you have the time to perform your task twenty times (in most cases, two minutes, since each round is 6 seconds), then there's no need to roll- just assume you rolled a 20 and be done with it. (After all, statistically, if you roll a d20 twenty times, you're going to roll a 20 at some point.) It won't always be an option (as you can't "take 20" if there is any consequence for failure, and you won't always have the time in-game) but it's definitely a handy rule to keep in mind.